


oh, we won't go (back to the room where we sold our souls)

by CourtneyCourtney



Category: IT (2017), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-05 06:45:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19043269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CourtneyCourtney/pseuds/CourtneyCourtney
Summary: Bill Denbrough doesn't remember his daemon settling.





	oh, we won't go (back to the room where we sold our souls)

Bill doesn't remember Tyche settling.

He knows it happened the summer Georgie died. It makes sense. The memory must be twisted up in the grief from his brother's disappearance, something he forgot to hold onto amid the drowning feelings of denial and guilt.

He's asked Tyche if she remembers, time and again, and every time her answer has to do with feeling acceptance, but her memory is no less vague than Bill's.

"It isn't that strange," she reminds him one sleepless night, after college, after he's submitted another story to another contest the way that cycle continues. "A lot of our friends' daemons settled that summer too."

Bill frowns down at the softshell turtle in his lap. "They did?"

Tyche hums in response. "I think so. I think they did back then."

"Whose?" Bill asks. He can see a flash of red feathers, a dog biting somebody's ankle, but he doesn't know if they're daemons or just wild animals. He can't conjure up any names or faces to go with them, anyway.

"I don't remember," Tyche replies, sounding just as fogged as Bill's memories.

He reaches down to stroke her back. "That's alright," he says. "You're in good company in that respect."

Still, it's strange to have a gaping hole around what's supposed to be the biggest change in a young person's life. Bill knows he can't be expected to remember everything, but this would have been huge.

A thought comes to him then, floating up out of a dream maybe. He's had years to get used to her form now; he knows Tyche is a spiny softshell, knows the rubbery feeling of her back and snout, knows her webbed feet like he knows his own hands. And yet...

Bill feels a sense of jamais vu, and a fleeting thought of almost dropping Tyche, of her being unexpectedly heavy and slippery in his small hands. He can feel tears of frustration and exhaustion prickling in his eyes, and he sees darkness, nothing but darkness.

He remembers water and hands like ghosts, waving in and out of the black.

"We took turns carrying you," Bill says. The words tumble out of his mouth, and he knows what they mean, but he isn't sure where they came from.

Tyche cranes her neck to look around the edge of her shell. "Who did?"

Bill tries digging into the images in his mind. "I don't know, but I... We had to get out of somewhere right after you changed, and there were people who helped me carry you because we were..."

"Underground?" Tyche supplies, ever patient.

Bill frowns. "Maybe." He isn't sure what place would be both underground _and_ wet. Something in him aches right down to the bone.

Under Bill's hands, Tyche moves. Bill takes the hint and sets her down on the floor. She's probably headed for the wading pool in Bill's closet.

Instead, Tyche sits there and looks up at him. "I'd like to know, too, Bill," she says softly. "You know I would, but I think you're thinking too much."

Bill huffs a quiet laugh. "I'm a writer; it's what I do best."

Tyche smiles a tiny smile. "Don't chase after it too hard. I trust that the memory will find its way back to us. It will, someday."

"I'm sure it will," Bill replies as she wanders off. In any good story, he'd remember it someday.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Hippo Campus's "Souls"
> 
> I wanted this to be a whole capital-s Story, but I had trouble pinning down daemons for the other Losers. (Except Richie - he has a scarlet Macaw nicknamed Lucille Ball. I got that much for some reason. Mike would probably be some kind of herding dog, and Eddie and Stan might have different types of bird, but yeah. I got nothing else right now.)
> 
> Tyche was the Greek goddess "who governed the fortune and prosperity of a city" and whose name I chose to play up Bill's connection to protecting Derry. 🐢


End file.
